DIY Earthworm Habitat

With Earth Day coming up, I wanted to do a fun Earth Day Experiment where we could observe some of nature up close. And I thought what better creature than earthworms. They really do so much for our soil, they are every gardeners friend, and they are really small (which helps when bringing in creatures to your home).

When I told my daughter that we were going to do a DIY Earthworm Habitat she was more excited than I expected. We had to wait for a break in all the snow we were getting to go out and collect our worms. It is funny how in the summer we find worms all over but in the winter not so much (they are cold blooded), we did find a bunch of small/baby worms which I think worked out better anyway since our habitat is not huge.

We are in trouble because my daughter does not want to put our wormy friends back, she now thinks they are our pets and both girls look forward to checking on them each morning. They also show them off to every friend that comes over to visit. So we will be keeping our worm friends around for a little while longer, but I think for right now they are much in our habitat since it is nice and warm. I will have to have the talk with my daughter soon though about setting them free.

What do Earthworms do? Earthworms are the Earths friend, they eat the soil (or compost material) and as it goes through them and out the other end they add extra nutrients to the soil. This is why a lot of people put worms in their compost bins (if you do you need to be careful about adding to much acidic items like tomatoes, oranges, and onions as they can burn the worms), the worms make the soil very nutrient which helps your plants grow. The worms also aerate the soil by digging tunnels, this brings plants the oxygen they need to grow.

What you will observe with this experiment? In this experiment you will view the worms mixing the soil and sand. They do this two ways, by digesting it and by traveling through it. You will also get to see how the worms travel through the soil by creating tunnels, which help to aerate the soil. Just make sure to keep your worms fed and the soil damp.

I love this idea, as well as how you used items from around your house. Your little one looks so happy to be collecting and observing worms! I’m hoping to do this with my son and my preschool students sometime this month. Thanks for linking up with Stress-Free Sunday!

This is fabulous! We have had a compost bin for years but I’m not sure if the boys really know what happens and this would be a great visual! It is also a great visual for not using synthetic fertilizers in our lawns that hurts the worms in their habitats. Thanks for sharing at Red Ted. Sara @ BrainstormInBloom

This is really cool!! My boys would be thrilled if we did this activity. Thanks for sharing! I wanted to invite you to share this on my Thursday link up party. http://www.teachingmama.org Hope to see you there!

We just finished a week full of worm activities. I tried to find two different-sized jars to do my own habitat, but I never thought to create one like this! So clever! We’ll definitely be trying this out.

Thank you so much for sharing this great idea at the Discover and Explore themed linky. I’m excited to see what you link up next week for the Gardening with Kids theme.

How long can the worms stay in the container? What is a good time frame for this experiment? I would love to do this as a science fair experiment with my students. I have to figure out when to start it so we could have some science journals and the completed project.